-Posted from my iPad.

A nice compact package, and it is cheap too at $12.99.

So the Slap Chop seems to be the same crappy $9.99 chopper i had years ago with a new name and the backing of the best salesman in the world; Vince. Though Vince is quick to explain that is definitely not like the one I used to have, and then “sinks” the most unlikely of behind the back shots ever! I only made it 37 seconds into the commercial before I felt like a substandard piece of shit for not owning 3 Slap Chops. Vince made it very clear that my life is boring, and that it has no chance of being exciting until I am Slap Chop-ing my troubles away.

He had me on the hook, I was reaching for my credit card, and then he said it. “YOU’RE GONNA LOVE MY NUTS”.

Holy Shit. It was right then I thought maybe this is a parody? Is this just a joke? No, Vince was deadly serious about how much you will love his nuts. I can imagine the 25 takes it took to get that right, because Vince sounds quite sincere about his nuts. Your gonna love my nuts, your gonna love my nuts, Your gonna love my nuts.

And it is true, his nuts are uniformly chopped and lovely.

Well played Vince. 

The only one I could stand was the Apple + Boxee. And even though Boxee is still in Alpha, it is a crap load better than using WMC. It is the integration of video sources like Hulu that really make it great + the ability to view my local media makes it indispensable. If you couldn’t tell yet, my goal is to get as much media as possible to my TV with the least amount of BS.

I also like to have a variety of media sources like internet based as well as my local media files. Just video though, audio is all handled by my Sonos. Anyone who knows the Sonos, knows I am not in the market for a new audio streamer as I already have the best. I love it so much I am gonna name my first born Sonos. But where is the Sonos for Video? 

OK so I still don’t have that all in one solution I am looking for. I don’t believe there is a way for me to play my local Xvid – DivX files via the XBOX MC (I haven’t looked yet), but NetFlix on the XBOX is awesome. Go online, and drop something in your ‘Watch Instantly’ queue and it immediately populates on your XBOX, ready to play on your TV, in HD in some cases. It is quick and easy and it doesn’t even take long to buffer on my shitty Time Warner connection. Well worth the $8.95 a month for so many high quality movies and tv shows sent right to my XBOX. Yesterday I watched 11 episiodes of Jericho and the movie FEDS with Rebecca DeMornay, and I have about 100 things after it in the queue including the full seasons of about 10 other shows.

Well worth $8.95. Plus I still get movies sent to my house if it is not available for instant streaming, like Ed and his Dead Mother. A classic for any fan of Steve Buscemi or the walking dead. (sitting in my mailbox now!) 

So I guess I am going to mess with my XBOX to see if I can get it to play movies requiring codecs, I am sure there is hack around by now. If I can make that happen, it has a chance of being my perfect media player. Oh and if you don’t want to mess with your XBOX for movies, Roku makes a box for $99 that will pull down NetFlix instantly in the same way; sans all the Microsoft gaming malarky.

In a “now your shit is outdated and worthless” move reminiscent of something Apple would do, Flip Video has released the Flip Video Mino HD (720p). Like a month after I purchased the Flip Video Mino, which I still love for it’s portability but loathe for it’s inability to focus on any kind of fine detail such as print.

Anyhoo, I got a great deal on an HD camera during the Circuit City fuck up fire sale last week, so I am not necessarily in the market for a 3rd camera in a month. However once this thing drops below $199, I am sure I will be replacing my Mino. Here is hoping they work out that fine detail issue, then it would really be perfect.

It looks like the casing is nearly identical to the original Mino. Now it has 4GB of storage instead of 2GB to accommodate the 1 hour of HD video. As usual, pop out USB for sync and charging.

$229 on Amazon

This makes me want to get rid of my cable service, but who knows what will happen if and when Apple releases a new update? Let’s not think about that now. This is indeed a major step forward in integrating all the media you would ever want into one place. And as far as installation and usability, I have no complaints. I mean it is still in alpha and it is this good! The install was not bad at all as long as you follow the instructions on the Giz, and make sure that you update all the components of Boxee before running it. So take a look at the video below, as I detail the install and the usage of Boxee on the Apple TV.

So as you might have heard Circuit City is not doing too well. And though I prefer them to Best Buy, it looks like the time for CC might be coming to an end. Last week they announced they would be closing 20% of their stores, just days before announcing that they would be filing for bankruptcy. Ouch.

Well one of the stores being closed is the one near me, and they have 10% to 30% off of most things, so I thought I would go and see what kind of open box goodness I could enjoy. A few weeks back I reviewed the Flip Video Mino camera, take a look here. I love that little camera, and the video quality is pretty nice for something that fits in your pocket. The downside? It can’t read displays or text off of my computer or iphone or anything printed at all. It just won’t focus on it. So that is the only disappointment in a pocket sized video camera, fine with me. But still I had a gap to fill. 

I walked into circuit city and it was a mad house. I saw a nice little flash based camera that would be fine for recording short blurbs and it would certainly be able to zoom in on small text of all kinds. It was open box and was going for around $150. It still had the battery, charger and manual; just no box. I thought about what a great deal I was getting as I took it up to the counter…

Anyway, I paid and I was on my way. Once home I pulled out the manual to check out the functions, and noticed a second battery in the plastic bag. Score! Free spare battery! Then I saw something wasn’t right, the model number on the manual did not match the model number on my camera.

It turns out they had this camera grouped with the wrong set of cameras. They were trying to keep all the same model open boxes together, however a lot of the Samsungs use the same casing, and you have to check the model number on the inside of the screen to tell the difference. Well I paid about $150 for a $400+ HD (720p w/ HDMI) Camera. Not the top of the line by any means, but way above what I paid for!

I thought this was a nice change after years of being over-charged by retail, now it is my turn to taste a little victory.

Thank You Veterans!

Click here for an update!

Well in order to live the dream with my ATV I need to first hack it with Boxee. With the addition of Boxee to my ATV I will be able to use a multitude of online video sites, such as Hulu. That in itself is amazingly cool, and add that to the reasons I mentioned above and I am sold! 

Well Boxee is not for sale. It is currently in alpha, and as much as I want to hack the shit out of my ATV to start enjoying my media again, I am stuck on a waiting list for alpha testers. Which after this article on the Giz, I can only imagine is about a bazillion people long. 

Anyway, Patience is a good thing, so I will wait. But hopefully Boxee won’t make me wait too long. A nice picture to look at while I am waiting…

A perfect rainbow over the Boxee offices in Tel Aviv, Israel. I have been to Israel a couple times, going again in 2009. I need to get to Tel Aviv this time!

Click here to jump to the update

As you can see I am not thrilled with the use of WMC, so I want to move on to another option like the Apple TV or the Western Digital TV. But which?

OK first, Apple TV which is already into it’s 2.0. It is small and easy like most Apple products, it can play HD and now with a little hacking (1 or 2) you can play all xvid and divx videos on it. Also you can download movies directly from the apple store for $2.99 and $3.99. There is a 40GB for $229 and a 160GB for $329. However with the same hack you can hook up an external hard drive via usb, so get the 40GB and save some money. Also it seems you can now get Hulu on your Apple TV, that is a major bonus.

OK so next, the Western Digital WD TV. This is a bit of a different take on a media player than the Apple TV. There is no built in storage, it is all provided via your attached USB drive(s). The cost is $129, so you are saving some money, and chances are you already have a usb hard drive around to hook up to it. But here seems to be the catch, in order to play most of your videos you will have to convert them with the included software. Which is kind of the reason I am using the HP still, I can play all formats without any conversion. Something not possible with the Apple TV up until recently via the hacks (1 or 2) I talked about earlier.

They both look good and have slick interfaces, they both do 1080P, both have HDMI, both can accept USB hard drives and I am sure there is or soon will be a rental service for the WD to match the Apple. But when it comes down to it, I don’t want to convert thousands of files over to a proprietary format. I would rather convert the Apple TV to play all of my files just once. I guess that is my answer.

I think I am going to get a 40GB Apple TV and give it a try. I will let you know how it goes.